Discrimination in the media [Part1]

I read a comment piece on a website today. I’m not going to mention the website, neither am I going to mention the writer. I feel doing so might lend credence to the ignorance and utter hatred perpetuated in that piece. I’m all for freedom of expression. I’m all for telling the world what you think. As Voltaire once (allegedly) said: “I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

However, spreading fear and inciting hatred against a particular group of people, based on colour of skin, religion, whatever (and in the case of this article, it was religion; isn’t it always all about religion nowadays?)… is wrong. It’s despicable in my opinion and I think people who discriminate based on others religion are not very open-minded.

This article pretty much insults and groups members of that religion under the tag of being potential killers (I kid you not) and eventually going off their rocker and being violent. I’m sorry what? The owners of the website that hosted this hate-filled article (and it can in no way be interpreted otherwise) said they would not fire the author simply because they felt open speech was important to democracy. I understand the sentiment of free and open speech, but … seriously?

Every decade or so in the history of the world, people at large love to pick on a group of people. They love to bully them, defame them and treat them like lower-class. At one time, dark-skinned people (or blacks; is that still PC?) were abused in this way. At one time, gay people were meted out terrible treatment (and still are, however I believe they enjoy more freedom now than ever before). Now… it’s the turn of another. Another group of people who are stared at, feared and have a phobia associated with them…and because of what? A few people who happened to belong to the same religion who turned out to be killers? How is that fair? If that is the case, we must fear every single person from every single religion, correct?

Terrorism, as the media often mistakenly points out, is not about religion. They need to get that into their heads.

And now…are we going to have to go through decades of hate against this group of people before another option, another bullying opportunity, another group fits the hate-criteria? And then the cycle will continue all over again.

Note: I say Part 1 as I do have a few comments to make on lectures we’ve been sitting through hosted by the University of Sheffield guest lecturer, Christopher Dickey, who is probably one of the few media personalities who doesn’t discriminate against people based on their religion and is fair in his views on matters like these.